Sorrows of Surfing

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 478, 6 October 1928, Page 26

Sorrows of Surfing

HOW TO. won) ANDi HO.O'p/ | > 1 ' / f TREAT YOURSELF

Hints from a Doctor

The bathing season will soon be with us in Auckland, and a few words of advice to enthusiasts mag perhaps save them many days , or even weeks , or pain and discomfort. For the unwary . a not-inconsiderable amount of danger lies in bathing and sunbathing. These hints may help to make summer swimming safer rrn.d vn.nre nleasant

HEX the first warm day comes along that tempts you to lie on the golden sands, remember that sunburn can be, and sometimes is, a very dangerous disease. Death from sunburn is not unknown. I remember (says a doctor, a specialist in skin troubles, writing in the Sydney “Sun”) once seeing a boy of eighteen who had three huge blisters on his back which eventually turned septic. He did not lose his life, but he spent the rest of the summer in a private hospital. When you go in for your first bathe take the precaution not to stay in your bathing costume too long. The art of becoming bronzed lies in a steady succession of short sun-bakes rather than a very long dose at any one particular time. If you put a little coconut oil on the skin before you go in, you will find that that will help you as well. If, however, these precautions have been told you too late or if you neglect to avail yourself of them, ask your chemist for some calamine lotion for the vivid red and horribly itchy back and shoulders you are sure to get. If the skin breaks and begins to look nasty, you will be very foolish if you don’t consult a medical man at once. A prominent Macquarie Street ear and throat man told me last summer that a good surfing season meant another thousand a year on his income. Sand gets into the ears, not only

through the external meatus, but also by way of the mouth and nose. It works its way up the connecting tube (the eustachian tube) and sets up sometimes a very violent inflammation. If you begin to suffer from pains in the ears, put a little hydrogen peroxide into the ear to dissolve out the sand and wax. If the pain persists after you have done this, stop your surfing and go and see your doctor. There is a popular delusion that you cannot catch cold in salt water. While it is perfectly true that the liability to cold is much stronger in the case of fresh water than salt, it is quite untrue that salt water renders you immune. You catch a cold or you get pneumonia because your resistance has been lowered, and if you stay in the water too long or if you fool round on the beach after a cold wind has come up you are merely asking for trouble. It is not an uncommon sight to see people miserably walking home from the beach in cold, clammy bathing costumes, the while a biting wind makes them shiver like a French jelly in a gale. If the day is at all chilly go in for your surf, come out, and have a brisk rub-down and get dressed. The surfing season generally means a considerable increase in income to the chemists and medical men of the seaside suburbs. It often only needs a little common sense on the part of the venturesome or reckles bather to avoid these unwelcome additional expenses.